Video hosting web sites allow users to access videos by both searching using keywords and by browsing in categories or channels. Using either approach, a user is presented with a list of videos from which he can choose to view. Once a user finds a video of interest and selects a link to the video, the link directs the user to a webpage where the video or details of the video may be viewed. The video hosting website may allow a user to search and view videos contained within the video hosting website, or videos located or, or sourced from other websites. In some video hosting websites, the selection of a video viewing causes the system to display a set of videos that are related to the video being viewed. In conventional methods, the related videos are determined using keywords from an initial search, or based upon tags associated with the currently viewed video, or based upon which videos or authors are popular.
While the conventional method can select videos that are potentially of interest to the user, many times the selected videos do not contain the material the user is interested in and it requires effort on the user's part to view the content of the individual videos to determine for themselves if the video contains relevant material. Accordingly, users waste valuable time viewing videos with potentially no related content instead of initially being displayed related videos with a high probability of containing truly relevant or interesting material.